One-hour Covid test approved for rollout

George Gilbert, 85, and his wife, Domneva, 84, are being treated at Addenbrooke’s in Cambridge and are part of a trial aimed at preventing organ failure in patients

KIRSTY WIGGLESWORTH/AP

Katie Gibbons

Saturday May 23 2020, 12.01am, The Times

A test that detects coronavirus in just over an hour without the need for a laboratory has been given regulatory approval to be introduced across Britain.

The small swab requires no medical expertise and is minimally invasive. Importantly, it differentiates between an imperfect sample and an absence of the disease, eliminating false negatives.

In hospital settings it means that patients requiring emergency surgery can be assessed quickly. Surgeons will not have to wear cumbersome PPE unnecessarily. For women in labour who are tested on arrival, it is the difference between holding their newborn baby or having to wait up to 72 hours for a traditional test to come back.

The government has been piloting the DnaNudge test since April with 10,000 kits used in London